Beyond evidence: Anticipatory regimes in law

Abstract

This article lays the groundwork for a new approach to understanding how law engages with the future, based on the social science theory and practice of anticipation. Anticipation, as depicted by an extensive interdisciplinary literature, encourages a shift in attention from the future as a matter solely of probability and effect, to the future as a wider array of possibilities operating on the present. Notably absent from this literature is law. This article offers a framework for analyzing how law mobilizes future possibilities to serve present regulatory purposes, focusing in particular on the role of legal horizons, forms and affect.